[opendtv] Re: NHK demos UHD TV broadcast
- From: "Manfredi, Albert E" <albert.e.manfredi@xxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 31 May 2006 11:26:10 -0400
Craig Birkmaier wrote:
> At the FCC chairman's breakfast, Chariman Martin called
> into question the earlier FCC decision on Multicast
> Must Carry. He noted that having more channel choices
> might give the OTA laggards an incentive to buy a DTV
> set-top box or a new integrated receiver. There may be
> a grain of truth in this
Irrespective of the must-carry ramifications, of course there's truth in
that comment. It's obvious that what people want when they go to
subscription services is not the pleasure of the monthly bill but rather
the additional choice of programming. I noted with interest that Fox 45
in Baltimore is taking their multicast capability seriously, starting to
offer reruns of interesting old shows (e.g. Magnum PI and Heat of the
Night) even during prime time. This sort of thing is what I thought DTT
broadcasters should do, in spite of all the nay-saying that such
practice can only detract from the prime time audience of their main
channel. The net effect is what counts. The guy with the best multicast
offerings wins.
Contrast this with Fox 5 in DC, which so far only offers the 5.1
channel.
(By the way, my surprise at Fox 45 carrying WB 54 programming was
because these are two different networks. I understand that this was
only done for test, just like they were previously carrying an SD
version of their own 45.1, but I can't understand how one network
carries another network's content. That's all.)
I can also agree with you that broadcasters can likely negotiate
carriage of these multicasts with the cable companies, if they spend a
little effort in making good choices. That's a different discussion,
though. It has zero to do with the atrtractiveness of DTT per se.
> The absurdity of Chairman Martin's comment about
> multicasting, is that there is NOTHING stopping
> broadcasters from offering more sub channels.
The "absurdity" is only linking must-carry with offering DTT multicasts.
Other than that, what Martin said was drop-dead obvious. Multicasts make
DTT more appealing, and encourage people to buy into DTT.
> Somehow the chairman seems to think that multicasts
> make the FTA product more attractive,
Duh!
> Meanwhile, the buzz at NAB was mobile video, and WE
> ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT HDTV. Finnally, the light bulbs
> seemed to be turning on in some broadcasters heads...
>
> "Hey, we need different products at different
> resolutions to satisfy all of the different viewing
> venues and devices that will have access to our
> content in the future. One size does NOT fit all!"
It never has. You're not saying anything new here. Even with HDTV, not
all displays need to be alike. HDTV has been displayed by all manner of
monitors already, from SD to 1080p, so the idea that "one size fits all"
has never been part of this.
In broadcast media, like DTT, cable, and DBS, it makes perfect sense to
transmit as much information as bandwidth allows, and then let the
paring down be done at the receiver. Rather than waste bandwidth with
various versions of the same program.
Bert
----------------------------------------------------------------------
You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:
- Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at
FreeLists.org
- By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word
unsubscribe in the subject line.
Other related posts: